Monday, February 14, 2011

eNVe Designs Giveaway {feb 14- feb 20th}

A while back I made a treasury on Etsy. It made the front page {toot toot}

and I have no doubt the

set of beautiful earrings I included from eNVe Designs helped make that happen.

Lets hear a little bit about Ngan and her shop, shall we.

{this week I am pretending to be Oprah}

Tell us a little bit about yourself and your shop-

Hi everyone! My name is Ngan Vuong. I'm a proud wife and mom. In my former life (the one before kids), I was near the end of my climb toward becoming a child psychologist. But as soon as I earned my doctorate, my husband and I had a baby and I decided to put my professional life on hold. We now have two vibrant and energetic children, a 3-year-old son and a 21-month-old daughter. I'm still at home full time with them and they make my jewelry and run my Etsy shop for me. Just kidding about the last part of course. I am with them full time and they definitely keep me busy and exhausted, but very happy. I consider the past few years detailed field research in child psychology and WOW has it been insightful so far!

When I'm not chasing after the little ones, I'm busy designing and creating jewelry. I make one of a kind pieces, usually with sterling silver and amazing quality gemstones (I kind of have an addiction to them and need to have them near me as much as possible). I also love working with gold and in the past couple years have really developed a fondness and appreciation for vintage materials and antiqued metals, so I try to integrate those into some of my designs as well. One of the things that I enjoy most about creating my jewelry is thinking about how to make the pieces truly versatile and functional with all the different aspects of a woman's wardrobe and her personality, then translating that into a quality piece that she can get many miles out of.

If I was standing in your workspace right now would I say wow she is organized or WOWZWERS she needs to get organized?

Hmm, can we say organized chaos? Right now, it's a little bit of both. I definitely need to have a place for everything, otherwise I get overwhelmed with all the tiny pieces of this and that everywhere. In that sense, I'm organized. I need to be able to find things quickly when I need them. That being said, my work surface is sometimes an array of several pieces I'm currently working on along with various gems and chains and materials that I want to use in new pieces.

You donate 10% of your sales each year to a charity in honor of your personal journey, how do you pick the charities?

Well, my personal journey was a psychological one so I wanted that to be an important aspect of the charity. I also have a huge soft spot in my heart for children and I hate that there are children out there in the world facing suffering and hardships. So I usually look into charities that meet one or both of those aspects.

Do you ever have creative slumps? And if so how do you overcome them?

Absolutely! Are you kidding? Sometimes I feel like I'm always in a creative slump, but I just have to remind myself that the creative process is never stationary. It's constantly flowing and moving.. it's an ever-evolving process with peaks and valleys. Personally, I feel that a necessary part of that process is being down there in the lows. For me, that's where my senses are heightened and I'm open to inspiration. Maybe that's just me trying to rationalize and embrace that unpleasant stretch of time when I feel like all my ideas stink (if I'm lucky to have any ideas) and I don't like anything I'm making. But knowing that I won't be there forever does help. It also helps to put down the jewelry and do something else that's creative... write, paint, play music, knit, take pictures, dance with my kids, build a fort, anything that doesn't involve jewelry. Something I WISH I could do is jump into a pool of gorgeous, sparkling gems, and swim around like Scrooge McDuck did in his money vault. I bet that would make me happy. One day. :)

What is your most prized possession {non-human}?

Oh goodness... I'm not sure that I have one. I'm glad you clarified "non-human" because I would've immediately said my family. I guess if every physical possession I have were to disappear this second, the thing that would leave a hole in my heart would be losing all my photos (of the kids, of family and friends... of all the places we've seen, all the things we've experienced... of all those little every day moments that I've been lucky enough to capture). So definitely my photos, and my camera. And maybe my gem vault when I get one.

Describe your perfect day.

Oh wow.. this is something I've actually never thought about. What would my perfect day look like? Let's hop into my daydream. Well first, I think I would get up just before dawn. No bed head. I get in my daily work out. My husband and I will have a delicious homemade breakfast together and enjoy a hot cup of freshly brewed coffee while watching the sunrise. We'll discuss current events while admiring how beautiful the sunlight lights up our spotless house. The kids would wake up in perfectly pleasant moods and join us for breakfast. They would then play nicely together and we would carry on with our morning routine tantrum and time-out free. After lunch, the kids would both nap willingly and simultaneously, sleeping for a full two hours. During that time, I would be able to create the most amazing and inspired jewelry I've ever created in my life, with plenty of time to photograph, edit, list, promote those pieces. I would then have time to do laundry, tidy the house, and start on dinner before the kids wake up. When the kids are up, we run around and have our daily mini-adventure. Then daddy comes home and dinner is magically done on time, and the kids both eat every bite of what's on their plates without prompting or protest. Then they have daddy time and are bathed and in bed by 9. Once kids are in bed, I'll have time to do a little more work, package up orders, etc. My husband and I will then wind down with a nice glass of red wine and a movie or one of our favorite shows. He would then surprise me with a weekend getaway trip to some tropical destination. That would be a perfect day. I don't really ask for much, right? ;)

One lucky winner will get to pick one of these beautiful My Open Heart necklaces.

PLEASE leave one comment PER entry below.

- Head over to eNVe Designs, mark it as a favorite and then come back with something you are

*hearting*. And while you are at it check out Ngan other shop Daily Dose.

Oh man my dream day.. I think my dream day would be taking my girls with my husband to a large zoo that had lots of petting areas so that they could interact with the animals but also had an area that has rides. Just spending the entire day with them.. heading home, leaving the girls with grandma and heading out to dinner and a movie with my husband and ending the night laying on the grass under the stars!